This is a great topic! It is no secret that online marketing is the way to go these days. Being able to get directly in front of your customer with a new product that will surely catch their eye is the best way to increase sales. It has happened to me quite a few times! John surely knows what works and I think all of his retailers should be happy to have him around. Thanks John!

INCREASE SALES UTILIZING “PUSH” EMAIL – SAVE MONEY

For the past couple of years, I have been strongly encouraging retailers to implement an online communication strategy with their customers. I’m especially motivated to write this article because as I travel the country regularly and visit with retailers, I find that a large percentage of them still aren’t using this very effective marketing vehicle. What exactly is “push” email? Push email is a method of pushing content (email in this case) over the Internet to your targeted audience (customer). Another term for push email used to be ‘Webcasting’ which literally means broadcasting over the Web. Communicating with customers through push email, is the most effective means today to:

1) reach customers quickly

2) achieve a higher percentage of customers actually scanning or reading the offer

3) motivate a higher percentage of customers to act on the offer

4) reduce marketing costs, while improving sales results and frequency of store visits

It has been shown that it costs five times as much to attract a new customer to your business than it does to retain a current one. Utilizing push email has proven to be very effective over the years by independent footwear retailers, as well as national chain stores and eCommerce retailers.

The key is getting started. It all starts with putting a system in place with your store associates, so they can start collecting customer email addresses immediately and consistently. You need to develop a data base that will be large enough in number to impact sales promotion results. Some customers will be hesitant to give out their email address, but most are more willing to give it to you than they are their home address or phone number. It’s how you present it to the customer, no different than suggestive selling at the fitting stool. If you tell the customer you’d like to have their email address so that they can be among the first to know when you run sales and promotions, most will respond positively!

The next step is to find a site that you can utilize to facilitate sending the promotional emails. The best choice is probably to utilize Microsoft Outlook, if you have access to that software. It will allow you to send mass emails more easily. If this is not available to you, there are many options to choose from, with Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail, and GMail being some of the more popular choices. Keep in mind, that these sights do set limits on how many recipients you can use per email message. So you might want to set up your customer list in groups by city, to ensure that you have lots of smaller group address lists versus one large group. Have someone on your staff continually add to these group lists to make it easy for you to instantly send email to your customer base.

A few tips: it’s important not to overuse this tool. If customers see an email from you too frequently, they’ll stop opening them and simply delete them without scanning. I receive daily emails from several eCommerce retailers and 90% of the time, I delete them without opening. It’s only when I see a catchy subject line from these retailers, that I open the email (more on this later). I would recommend utilizing push email probably 1-2 times per month. It’s a great vehicle to announce sale events, in-store promotions, new arrivals from top vendors, personal messages from the proprietor, etc. Using push email allows you to be more nimble too – for instance, if you’re having a really tough week, you can decide on a Thursday morning to send out a push email announcing a special promotion starting tomorrow, running through the weekend. If the offer is compelling, you’ll be surprised at how well your customers will respond and you’ll reap the benefits with increased sales.

Lastly, the content of your email message is critical. There is an art to it – remember, you want your customers to be sufficiently intrigued by the subject line, then hooked by the first couple of sentences, and finally motivated to act upon your message/offer. Here’s an article that I found on xdxy.com, regarding how to effectively write email marketing content:

7 Tips of Writing Email Marketing Content

May 22nd, 2009

from xdxy.com

Email marketing is one of the best ways to market your product. This type of marketing does not require as much investment, except for time, internet access and a flair for writing good copy.  One of the sure fire ways of succeeding in email marketing is that you are able to write emails that people actually read. At the same time, your methods in email marketing should be safe enough for you to avoid being labeled as spam.

Here are 7 tips to writing effective email marketing emails:

1. Have a catch: All good copies, regardless of use, have hooks. This should be the first couple of line that your recipient reads. Your hook should encapsulate your reason for emailing. A good hook may mean a great reason to email. Likewise, it can encourage your audience to read further or click on a link or two.

2. Follow the catch: A great catch is useless if you will just drop the ball in the end. When you hook your reader, make sure to follow it up with some necessary details. The catch in email marketing makes the reader curious. The follow-up, on the other hand, encourages the reader to decide: Will I click on or follow the link? Or will I just delete this message?

3. Be straight to the point: Of course, your email should read nicely. It should flow smoothly, with easily understood words and cohesive sentences. However, it should also be short and sweet. Do not assume that your reader has time to read through several paragraphs. In reality, you only have a few seconds to catch their attention.

4. Say the most important things first: If your spiel has several points, make sure to state the most important ones first. Readers read from top to bottom. They have a tendency to lose interest at some point. By stating your top points first, you may be able to rein in their attention up until the end of email.

5. Organize your email for scan ability: Emails, especially the email marketing kind, often do not get as much attention from its readers. Most of the time, people just scan through and then discard them. As an email marketer, you need to make the most of this by making sure your presentation gets its points across, even when just scanned.

6. Stay away from passive voice sentences: Engage your readers with how you say things. Passive voice sentences focus on how the subject is acted upon. On the other hand, active voice sentences focuses on the subject itself. The active voice is more powerful.

7. Watch your language: In writing for an email marketing email, you should know your audience, and you should write for them. Likewise, emails have a casual nature. Hence, stay away from traditional letter writing, as well as catchphrases and flowery words. Stay informal but respectful, and get to the point.

John Licata – VP Sales, Stride Rite